El Mayo was ordered detained pending trial after being transferred from Texas to New York, following his July 25 arrest in New Mexico. The defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
El Mayo pleaded not guilty.
(Month Old News Report)
“El Mayo, the co-founder and leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, has been charged with overseeing a multi-billion-dollar conspiracy to flood American communities with narcotics, including deadly fentanyl,” said Attorney General Merrick B. Garland.
Adding, “We allege that El Mayo built, and for decades led, the Sinaloa Cartel’s network of manufacturers, assassins, traffickers, and money launderers responsible for kidnapping and murdering people in both the United States and Mexico, and importing lethal quantities of fentanyl, heroin, meth, and cocaine into the United States. Now, El Mayo joins the many other Sinaloa Cartel leaders who have faced charges in an American courtroom for the immeasurable harm they have inflicted on families and communities across our country.”
El Mayo was first indicted in the Eastern District of New York in 2009, with a fifth superseding indictment filed in February. He co-founded the Sinaloa Cartel with Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, running the organization together until El Chapo’s arrest in 2016. El Chapo was convicted in 2019 and sentenced to life plus 30 years in prison.
The indictment alleges that from 1989 to 2024, El Mayo led a criminal enterprise responsible for importing and distributing massive amounts of drugs, generating billions in profits.
Mayo allegedly employed thousands across South and Central America, Mexico, and the U.S. to manage drug transportation routes and ensure distribution. El Mayo also used hitmen, or “sicarios,” to carry out kidnappings and murders in Mexico and the U.S. to protect his operations and retaliate against rivals or informants. Profits from the drug sales were laundered back to Mexico.
According to the superseding indictment and court filings, under El Mayo’s leadership, the Sinaloa Cartel expanded into fentanyl manufacturing and distribution by 2012, responsible for smuggling thousands of kilograms into the U.S. El Mayo also allegedly strengthened the cartel’s power by making millions in corruption payments and ordering violent acts, including retaliatory murders, up until just weeks before his arrest.
“Today’s arraignment is another forceful reminder of the FBI’s commitment to pursuing justice for the American lives lost to the violence and trafficking of deadly drugs, like fentanyl, associated with Zambada Garcia and those he directed as a leader of the Sinaloa Cartel,” said FBI Director Christopher Wray. “The FBI will not stop in our pursuit of those who engage and facilitate the cartel’s sophisticated operations that cause immense harm to Americans and poison communities across our country.”
“Defeating the Sinaloa Cartel is DEA’s top operational priority and today, with the capture and additional charges filed against Ismael Zambada Garcia we are that much closer,” said Administrator Anne Milgram of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). “Better known as ‘El Mayo’, Zambada Garcia is the co-founder and leader of the Sinaloa Cartel, one of the most ruthless and dangerous cartels in Mexico and responsible for the unprecedented drug crisis facing the United States. With Zambada Garcia no longer in power we have struck at the heart of the Sinaloa Cartel’s operations. He may have eluded capture for three decades, but today he is seeing what it means to face justice in America. Let this be a reminder to his associates and others, American lives depend on DEA remaining laser focused on destroying the cartels, their networks, and their global supply chain and that is what we will continue to do.”
If convicted, El Mayo faces a mandatory life sentence.
The FBI, DEA, and HSI investigated the case.
Trial Attorneys Melanie Alsworth and Kirk Handrich of the Criminal Division’s Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section; Assistant U.S. Attorneys Francisco J. Navarro, Robert M. Pollack, Adam Amir, and Lauren A. Bowman for the Eastern District of New York; and Assistant U.S. Attorney Andrea Goldbarg for the Southern District of Florida are prosecuting the case.